Calendar

Manic Monday Markup 8/29/16…

We begin today in Brazil where impeached President Dilma Rousseff is battling to save her political career. The lower house of the Brazilian legislature voted earlier this year to impeach Rousseff for fudging budget numbers—the nation faces a fiscal nightmare brought on, in part, by an economy on the skids—temporarily removing her from office. She now faces trial in the Senate, where she has vigorous defended herself.

Parts of Italy are still reeling following last week’s devastating earthquake. The death toll is currently measured at 290 authorities are investigating if negligent adherence to building codes contributed to the number of deaths.

Britain’s former prime minister Gordon Brown has proposed replacing the House of Lords with an elected Senate as a means to head off renewed calls for Scottish independence following June’s Brexit vote. The one-time Labour leader hails from Scotland.

A former Israeli Defense Minister whose bid to become his country’s president was derailed by allegations of corruption has died. Benjamin Ben-Eliezer was 80.

The Republican nominee for president, real estate tycoon and provocateur Donald Trump, remained a pretzel on immigration that has flummoxed even his closest aides. While he called for deporting criminal illegal immigrants in Iowa, running mate Mike Pence demurred on a solid answer on Trump’s immigrations stance. His campaign manager likewise could not untangle her boss’s mixed messaging.

Priebus to @chucktodd on Trump immigration shifts: "as you get closer to the WH, a degree of humanity and decency is part of every decision"

Last week the National Labor Relations Board ruled graduate assistants do qualify as employees under federal law and thus can collective bargain with their employers, i.e. the universities for which they work. The ruling overturns a previous one that said GA’s were ineligible.

CRRC, the Chinese companies slated to build railcars for Boston’s subway system, held its topping off ceremony at its Page Boulevard property, formerly the grounds of the Westinghouse plant.

Twitter Chatter:

This blog reluctantly indulged the latest Weiner sojourn, but unsurprisingly Trump is reveling in it. This unfortunate private episode made public would be bad enough if it were not being made into nonsense for the presidential campaign. Odder still is how it has quickly become the latest “case” against Clinton. Today we award the tweet prize to NBC News report Benjy Sarlin. In listing the list of bizarre and unsubstantiated attacks against Clinton—at least crooked is coherent, if also wrong—Sarlin points out how truly weird, undisciplined and incoherent the Trump campaign is. In other words, it’s just another day ending in “Y” on the presidential campaign trial.